The Newcomer (Thunder Point #2)(87)

“That’s okay. You don’t want to mess up your pants.”

He looked down at himself. He wasn’t dressed up by any means, just a pair of Dockers, a shirt, topsiders on his feet without socks. “I’m good,” he said, lowering himself to the sand. “I’m sorry life has thrown you some curves, Ashley. Is there any way I can help? Anything you want to know about me or my family?”

She sat down, lifted her bottled water and took a slug. “Well, how about, where have you been?”

He knew that wasn’t a literal question. “Well, I figured if I was my kid, I wouldn’t want to know about me. I’m not exactly anyone’s hero.”

“Mom said you used to be a real hoodlum, but straightened yourself out.”

“I served time, Ashley. She told you that, right?”

She nodded. “You must’a been a badass. What screwed you up?”

“Me. I screwed me up. I wasn’t kicked around as a kid, my mother washed my clothes, had dinner on the table every night and my dad tried to get me interested in sports, but I fell in with a fun crowd and thought I was smarter than everyone else because I had a job that paid nine dollars an hour. I dropped out of school to work more and spent my money on cars, liquor and dope. When I heard I’d gotten my girlfriend pregnant, I ran and found another good-paying job as a grease monkey and a bunch of cool friends who not only drank and doped, but found an interesting way to improve themselves—they robbed convenience stores and liquor stores. That’s pretty much the quick summary.”

“I take it you got caught,” she said.

“I drove the car,” he said. “First time out, I got caught.” He closed his eyes briefly. “Listen, there’s no reason you have to tell anyone that your biological father is an idiot and an ex-con. Your secret is safe with me. I don’t want you to be embarrassed.”

“I’m not embarrassed, Eric. I’m not the ex-con.” Then she looked out at the bay, at the guy on the paddleboard. Then back at him. “I bet you have a lot of regrets.”

He pulled his knees up and looked out at the bay. “Kind of, kind of not. The thing about the hard times, the stupid times, they make you who you are. And regrets— I look back and ask myself if I didn’t do a certain thing that I’m really ashamed of, how would that change the present? What would it erase from my current life? What if I hadn’t been such a badass idiot back then? Would I have learned the cost of that recklessness? Would you be here? There are things I’m totally ashamed of that I wouldn’t change. I ran out on your mom, but if I had stepped up and married her, oh, God, would she have gotten a bad deal. I was such an irresponsible ass**le.”

“And now?” she asked.

“I’m all right,” he said with a shrug. “I abide by the laws. I have a little business and a girlfriend. My folks are starting to forgive me. I treat people right. I don’t drink or do drugs. I’m nothing special, but at least I’m not unsafe. I’ve learned a lot.”

She sighed. “Me, too.”

“I hope you don’t mind, but your mom told me some of what you’ve been through. Specifically, the boyfriend, the hospitalization...”

“She told me she did. She was looking for medical history, like does hearing voices run in your family....”

He couldn’t help it, he chuckled. “No official mental illness that I’m aware of, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have crazy people in my DNA. Probably starting with me. So, Ashley, how are you getting along now? How are you feeling?”

“Oh, I feel kind of emptied out. I had a boyfriend dump me, but I’m not pregnant or in jail. I’ve been in therapy and group therapy and I’m very tired of seeing pain everywhere. When I was in the hospital, one of the other patients was my age and had tried to commit suicide, over a boy. It was shocking to think how dangerous that could be, how far something like that could go. I wish I’d never met her so I wouldn’t have to think about how hopeless she must have felt to do that to herself. And I’m so grateful to have met her so I could see how far something like a broken heart could go, how much destruction there could be if we’re not careful.”

“I’m so sorry, Ashley. So glad there was a positive message in it for you.”

She lifted one shoulder and looked down. “The worst part is that I felt that way for a little while myself, but I just didn’t follow through. I just couldn’t do that to my mom and Grandma. I wonder if that girl ever thought about that, about how people would feel.”

“You felt that way because of the boyfriend?” he asked.

She nodded.

“What did your mom say about that? About the girl you met?”

“She said we don’t all have the same number of tools in our tool belts. That she did the best she could with what she had. And I do the best I can with my set of tools.”

“Your mom is pretty smart,” he said. “I hope you have a tool for telling the ex-boyfriend to go pound sand.”

She gave a soft laugh. “Oh, I still want things back the way they were, but I’m not dumb enough to take that kind of chance. I might never get over him, but I’m done with him.”

“Things almost never go back to the way they were, Ashley. That’s one of the hardest lessons—that you can’t undo things and you can’t unsay things. When you pass through something like that, you have to build something new.”